.jpg)
Excellence Above Talent Podcast
The Excellence Above Talent podcast was started because of death trauma and pain. Men are 3.6 times more likely to commit suicide than women. Men predominantly do the violence that happens in the US. Men in the United States predominantly commit domestic violence and sexual assaults. Ninety percent of the prison population are men. I want to start a conversation to get clarity and insight on why this is happening. Families are being destroyed, lives are being lost, and people are hurting from the hands of men, men who were supposed to be the providers and protectors of their families. As a BIPP (Batterer’s Intervention and Prevention Program) Director for 4 years, I have had numerous conversations with men about why they thought abuse was necessary or did not even know they were abusers. The conversation had in our class helped open my eyes and the eyes of other men. I found out that men want to talk about these issues, but there is no platform or space, so we keep quiet, not wanting to challenge the status quo. The Excellence Above Talent podcast will do just that; it will challenge everything we think manhood is. Join the conversation and let us fight for the state of man because this next generation of young men needs us too.
Excellence Above Talent Podcast
Faith, Vulnerability, and Personal Transformation
Imagine transforming your life by embracing change and uncovering your true potential. Join me, Aaron Thomas, on this soul-searching episode of Excellence Above Talent as I recount my personal journey of confronting mental barriers and negative perceptions about wealth. From childhood misconceptions that led to self-sabotage, to utilizing faith-based affirmations to reshape my mindset, we delve into the broader implications of change. This episode reveals the crucial role of emotional, spiritual, and mental maturity in attaining the blessings we aspire to in life.
We also tackle the importance of vulnerability in relationships, especially before marriage. I open up about an eye-opening conversation with my partner that revealed hidden fears and tendencies to control. By sharing the challenges of relinquishing self-reliance and seeking spiritual guidance, I highlight how these realizations propel personal growth. Tune in to understand why embracing change is essential, how perseverance and self-awareness can foster a more fulfilling life, and the transformative power of facing life’s challenges head-on. This is an episode that encourages you to reflect, grow, and align more closely with your spiritual and personal aspirations.
#excellenceabovetalent #EAT #dontgiveup #youdeservethebest #youareenough ...
You're listening to Excellence Above Talent, a podcast where we have the hard conversations about the lives of men and what leads us to achieve greatness and suffer defeat. Hear from other men's journeys as well, as we all learn and grow together to become inspirations to ourselves and those around us. And now your host, Aaron Thomas.
Speaker 2:What's up my beautiful people, aaron Thomas, with Excellence Above Talent. There has been a struggle in my life that I have been dealing with, and that is a word called change. It's crazy because change is something that cannot be avoided, it's something that cannot be ran away from, it's something that's always staring in your face every second of every day. And, as humans, we are changing daily. Even if you don't see it or not, there is change happening on so many different levels. Your body is changing, happening on so many different levels. Your body is changing. Your mind could be changing. Your spiritual maturity could be changing. The way you talk, the way you see people all that can change in a matter of minutes and hours and all that can change within a day. There are two things as humans, we'll always be doing, and that's changing, and you can either fight the change or you could embrace the change.
Speaker 2:A lot of people fight change, and I say people. I fight change because of the unknown. I know what I've been through and what I can see, and that is comfortable for me. But as a man, as a person trying to lead themselves or a family, being afraid to change can create pressure from not only how you feel and what you feel inside, but pressure of wife and kids looking at you saying what's going on, what are we doing? I didn't have much growing up and I'm in this process of relearning myself and growing spiritually, mentally, emotionally, financially. And the financial part is really kicking my ass because mentally I've never had it and if I did have it I've had bits and pieces of it I would self-sabotage and find a way to screw it up because I didn't think I deserved it and I don't know, I don't know. Sometimes it feels easier to embrace the struggle than to just walk out into the fullness of what God has placed in you to do in this world, because when God blesses you, he blesses you, and it's not just financial. But I'm in a season where I have to constantly tell myself that I am deserving, that it's okay to get money or to have money doesn't make you a bad person.
Speaker 2:I think a lot of times I grew up with that mentality of if you had money, you got it in a bad way. There was a negative connotation. You were greedy, you screwed somebody over, you did something that you wasn't supposed to do in order to get the money that you got. That's kind of how I was growing up and I never really challenged or questioned those thoughts until here recently, when I'm trying to push forward and break through and find another avenue to create wealth and make money. And sometimes, when I would start to make money, I would again self-sabotage, start making dumb decisions, doing things I know I wasn't supposed to be doing, because I subconsciously was telling myself that I could potentially become a bad person or I didn't deserve it.
Speaker 2:And so in this moment in my life, I am using words of affirmation that come from the man himself God as to who and what I am in this world, and I have to constantly tell myself daily that I'm the head and not the tail. I'm above all and not beneath. I am a lender and not a borrower. I am a leader and not a follower. Whatever I touch turns into gold. I serve a limitless God, so there's nothing around me that I cannot have, nor want that God cannot give me. But in saying that, I just don't sit around and hope and pray and wish that things just come my way. You still got to get out there and you still have to work.
Speaker 2:But that mentality of changing how I view and who I view as good or bad because of money or not money. I have to realize that God is in the details and I can't be frustrated or upset if I don't feel like I am where I need to be because God is in the details. He knows, boy, if you get some money you're going to go plum stupid. So there has to be a maturing process that has to happen in order to get the blessing that God wants you to have, and I think it starts with change changing your mentality of how you view a thing that you're trying to figure out. If it's not finance, it's mental, it's emotional, it's sexual, it's spiritual, it's whatever it is that you're trying to figure out, and change is needed. And you begin to embrace that change and start looking within and trying to deal with why you do the things that you do.
Speaker 2:It's uncomfortable to sit in a dark room or while driving having these thoughts come up, because my first thoughts are I push them back, but they came up for a reason. When it comes to, why am I not better with money? Why have I not pushed past this? I feel like I'm on this plateau with money, and money isn't everything, but it's a lot of things and I don't want to create the notion that I just want a lot of money. There is a term called financial freedom. I want to be free when it comes to money, not worrying about bills, not worrying about if we blow through this savings fund, if something bad happens, what's next? It's not something that I have to worry about often, but these things creep into your head, especially if you don't have the necessary funds to take care of them and, as a man, that makes you feel less of a man.
Speaker 2:Sometimes with some men not all men, but with me particularly so I'm in this mental battle of who is going to be greater in my life. Will it be God, the creator of all things, that knows all things, that is limitless and that can bless you beyond measure, or will it be money, what the world is pushing on everybody to get and to have? And if you don't have, then you are lazy and poor and you don't get up and you don't try, which is also very stupid and ignorant, but that's just what the world is pushing in this moment. You got to have money, you got to have cash, you got to have money, you got to have money, and I found myself getting caught up into that aspect of it where placing money above God was something that I did because I didn't have much growing up and I want to have those things, but you lose sight of what those things are, and they are things. They will come, they will go. You can't take it with you.
Speaker 2:So I have to reshift and refocus my thought process on God and the things that he is doing in my life, because the things that he's doing in my life isn't by chance or a mistake. These are wovenly intricate plans that he is creating and setting up for something bigger, and I, as a man, have to be patient and not get caught up in what everyone else is doing and what everyone else has, because what is mine is mine. I don't have it now, but I will have it because I serve a God that can do and will do all things. But the God that I serve also isn't going to give me something I'm not ready for. So I can't get mad at God or Jesus for not giving me. So this is the issue. I see it through visions and through prophecy and through people talking to me. I see it. I see the things that I'm going to do. I see the things and the people and who I'm going to impact and change and inspire and motivate. I see it, and instead of going through the process, I want to cut straight to the fulfillment of what it is that God is going to do in my life, instead of going through the process of what I'm going to have to do in order to get it. And that goes back to what I was talking about earlier in this episode is change. I am going to have to change each and every day to find clarity and understanding, not to not sweat the small things, to pay attention to what I can control and what I cannot control. Let it go me and Yanni were reading a book uh, love Wired.
Speaker 2:So it's a pre-marriage book and they were talking about vulnerabilities and having your partner know your top two or three vulnerabilities so that in an argument or if I seem off or frustrated, she can pick up on. This is one of the things that he struggles with. And I gave her two of my vulnerabilities on a car ride just riding around, and I could not think of another. And she said maybe it is, when you don't get your way, you become more controlling, more aggressive, more frustrated, and in that moment we were driving around and I was doing DoorDash, making a few coins on the side on the weekends, and there was an order and the order got real stupid and something I should have took 15 minutes took 45 minutes and I was livid and I was upset and I was mad Because the more time it takes on the order, the less money I make. So I'm very efficient, or I want to be very efficient when I'm doing DoorDash or Instacart.
Speaker 2:What she brought to my attention when things don't go your way, when you feel like you're losing control, you become tight, more controlling, the tone of your voice is more aggressive, and that hit me like a ton of bricks, because I realized I was trying to put my faith in me when it came to if I needed to go out here and get this bread, I can do it myself, versus taking the time to talk to God and ask him and let him know what's going on. There wasn't a whole lot of talking to God in this spiritual drought. I was in Trying to do it myself and I'm going to tell you right now, fellas, it doesn't work and I had to go back and reset what. Can I control? My attitude, my emotions, my feelings, how I speak to people, what can I not control? Everything else, everything else. So putting this pressure on myself to be the be-all, end-all, it does create this other person that solely thinks about what they can do to better their circumstances, versus slowing down and asking God what's next. Where would he want me to go? Who would he want me to speak to? How can I help change this next generation?
Speaker 2:Change sucks Whether you do it or you don't. They both suck Because if you don't change, you stay in this defeated state where you feel inferior to others, where you feel like you're not enough and you're not worthy because you're stuck, like you're not enough and you're not worthy. Because you're stuck and because you're stuck, because you're not changing, you don't talk to yourself in a nice way. And the crazy part is, you see, when you don't change, you become a hater. Because you see the people around you making moves and changing their circle and changing the energy and the people that surround them, and you know that's in you and that's something you can do, but you're afraid and so, because you have this inferiority complex where you think you're not good enough, you become a hater. You think that those people think that they're better than you, and those people aren't even thinking about you. And the crazy part is you could change too. Nothing is stopping you from living that life. You're just afraid.
Speaker 2:And in order to change, diminish the fear that you have within you, you go out and you look down on others and you try to make yourself better than others so that you don't have to deal with that negative energy or that negative self-talk that you're dealing with within yourself. So you hide behind hating on people, gossiping, creating turmoil versus getting in the word, reading a book, working out, meditating on childhood traumas and trying to figure out ways you can be better. That sucks too. When you start to change and you start to grow, you become aware of how ignorant you really are, and that's scary as well. You thought you knew, but you really don't know anything.
Speaker 2:Once you really start to change and grow and try to figure life out, you think you have it together, but you don't. But you're willing to change and go through it anyway, each and every day. Because you don't, because you know, if you don't, where that leads you as well. So they both suck. They're both not fun, because you know, if you don't, where that leads you as well. So they both suck, they're both not fun, but if you push through and persevere on one aspect, you will find a way to blow up.
Speaker 2:If you don't quit, something to quit, something will get better. It has to. There is no ifs, ands and buts If you do not quit, if you keep moving forward. But if you become stagnant or you stop, and just because you don't think you're changing doesn't mean you're not changing, because maybe you aren't changing but the world around you is, and that's how you feel, like you're being left behind. Because if you don't change, you can't grow, and if you are not growing, you are killing the soil that you're walking on by being hateful, not to others, but to yourself first, and what's in you will come out of you. So embrace change.
Speaker 2:Don't run from it, because it's funny how a lot of people they think they can run from something that's attached to them and there's a string and it could be a long string or a short string, and when you start running and you hear it and you run faster and you get away from it and then you don't think it's coming anymore. It's still coming. It's just taking a little bit longer to get to that place where you're at, but at some point you're going to have to just face it or keep running. But that's just not a way to live life. I think I've been doing that for a pretty long time and I think I'm tired of living life running from the change that needs to happen on all aspects of my life mentally, spiritually, emotionally, financially.
Speaker 2:So if anyone hasn't told you today that they love you, let me be the first to say I love you. You're amazing, you're awesome. You deserve the best that this world has to offer. Do not give up, do not quit. The world does not get easier, but you get stronger. Y'all have a blessed day and have a great weekend. See y'all next week. Bye-bye.
Speaker 1:Thank you for listening. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast so you never miss an episode and for daily motivational and up-to-date content. Follow us on Facebook and Instagram at Excellence Above Talent. And remember keep moving forward, never give up and you are never alone in this battle. We'll see you next time, thank you.
